Fans are still reeling from the shocking Season 2 finale of Severance on Apple TV+, and what takes place in the finale can be looked at as the result of something that Devon Scout-Hale (Jen Tullock) set into motion.

At the end of Episode 8, she decides to contact Harmony Cobel (Patricia Arquette) in an effort to save her brother Mark (Adam Scott), who is having negative side effects from starting the process of reintegration from being severed. So if you look at it this way, idea of innie Mark going into Lumon to try to save Gemma (Dichen Lachman), though deciding to remain himself, was kicked into high gear once Devon got Cobel involved.

Why Devon decided to get Cobel involved

“I think it’s the pure desperation that any family member feels when there is an outside threat,” Tullock told Blavity’s Shadow and Act of Devon’s actions. “I think that she doesn’t have time to think it through. It isn’t conscious, it isn’t intellectual. For her, it is very much a gut reaction. I think she trusts Cobel as far as she can flick her, and I think that she also knows that it’s this plan or no plan, and that no plan would result in Gemma’s death.”

She continued, “And so she’s going on instinct alone. I think she’s exhausted. She has a newborn at home. She’s still breastfeeding. Her hormones are raging. And so we meet her in a moment, biologically, where I think she’s primed to make a desperate decision like this. I think that it reminds me of all of those old Greek plays that Euripides wrote about women on the verge of a breakdown where they’re capable of unthinkable acts. And I think that we’re meeting Devon in a moment where she is capable of an unthinkable act.”

Are Cobel and Devon waiting for Mark and Gemma to exit Lumon in the finale?

Earlier in the season, Devon reminds Mark that he isn’t the only one grieving Gemma. Now, with Gemma presumably out in the real world and Mark having an innie inside Lumon, the situation grows more complex—and more tragic.

“I will be really interested to see, when we continue, how that storyline proceeds,” Tullock said. “I think that there were some earlier iterations of the script for Episode 10 where we did see the literalized version of Gemma and Cobel with a getaway car with Devon and Ricken’s beat-up jalopy outside waiting to take Gemma away. But I think for story purposes, it didn’t make sense. But I do like the idea that that is still implied—that the plan was get her, get her in the car and drive somewhere.”

She added, “When that’s thwarted, I think Devon is forced to pivot again, and in real time she knows she doesn’t have any time. So I imagine she and Cobel would have the impulse to go to Lumon, but who’s to say? We will see.”

Devon talking back and forth with both the innie and outie Mark

The emotional pivots are especially noticeable in the scenes where innie Mark and outie Mark have a conversation through the video camera at the cabin. Devon is trying to play peacemaker but is also trying make sure that they are making progress. Tullock described how she approached Devon’s shifting energy between the two versions of her brother, and gave kudos to Adam Scott’s portrayal of both Marks.

“He’s drawn such a clear dividing line between innie and outie Mark that I have to respond in kind, which is very differently,” she explained. “So when Devon’s interacting with innie Mark, there is a childlike quality about him that requires her to be more gentle and more careful, but also, time is a-ticking. So playing those two truths simultaneously made for a lot of tension.”

Referencing a moment from Episode 9, she continued, “We see when they’re in the clearing, when they go to meet Cobel, and she says, ‘Listen to me, take a breath. This is the only option we have.’ I feel like that’s the first time we’ve really seen her snap at him and say, ‘Listen to me. This is what we’re doing.’ But we’ll see if that pays off. She obviously pitches the plan to him in a way that he rejects. And innie Mark says ‘No, I’ll die. What about all of the innies?’ Devon clearly has not thought through because in that moment she sort of just looks at him bewildered. So I don’t know where that will go.”

Severance Season 2 is now streaming in full on Prime Video. It has been renewed for Season 3.